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Experimental Futures
Plastic Bodies: Sex Hormones and Menstrual Suppression in Brazil
Duke University Press
Copyright:
This content is made freely available by the publisher. It may not be redistributed or altered. All rights reserved.
ISBN electronic:
978-0-8223-7419-0
Publication date:
2016
Book Chapter
Is Menstruation Natural?: Contemporary Rationales of Menstrual Management
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Published:April 2016
This chapter sets the practice of hormonal menstrual suppression alongside strategies of menstrual management that have long been available to women, such as abortion or “bringing menstruation down”. Historical and cross-cultural work on the substances used by women to manage their menstrual cycles or “bring down menstruation” reveal the porosity of the boundaries between contraception, abortion and menstrual regulation. The chapter provides a detailed analysis of the discourse of menstrual suppression in Bahia where menstruation is widely discussed in terms of its naturalness or artificiality. These debates are particularly interesting in that they argue that biology is shaped by social...
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